According to the final report of the investigation published this Sunday, September 1, the helicopter crash in which former Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi died last May was caused by “the sudden appearance of a thick mass of dense fog.”
The helicopter crash that killed former Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and members of his entourage in May was caused by bad weather conditions, according to the final report of the investigation published on Sunday, September 1, by state television.
The special investigation commission, formed by the General Staff of the Armed Forces, concluded that “the main cause of the accident was the complex climatic and atmospheric conditions of the region in spring,” according to the report.
The president, who died aged 63, was returning from inaugurating a checkpoint on the border with Azerbaijan when the helicopter crashed on May 19 in the mountainous northwest of the country.
“Sudden appearance of a thick mass of dense fog”
The report states that the accident was caused by “the sudden appearance of a thick mass of dense fog”, which led to the “collision of the helicopter with the mountain”.
The investigation rules out “any possibility that the helicopter was the target of offensive and defensive systems or electronic warfare.”
In August, the armed forces’ general staff “firmly denied” allegations by the local Fars news agency, which had suggested that the crash could be partly due to overloading of the aircraft.
The Iranian military had already said in May that it had found no evidence of criminal activity that could have caused the crash of the plane, which was carrying eight people, all of whom died, including Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian.
